Ping An Insurance (Group), the mainland's second-largest life insurer, is confident of maintaining double-digit growth in net profit and asset size at its banking and insurance units in the next few years.
Market watchers are concerned that growth in mainland insurers' results is driven mainly by investments in the stock market.
Ping An's net profit surged 145 per cent to 11.7 billion yuan in the first nine months, driven by better than expected returns on equity investments. Investment income shot up 248 per cent to 46.1 billion yuan.
Ping An's management said it was also optimistic in making robust investment gains in the fourth quarter.
'The buoyant mainland stock market is helping to improve our investment returns this year,' executive director and group president Louis Cheung Chi-yan said yesterday. 'Achieving similar momentum would be no problem.'
Mr Cheung said the company's long-term objective was making stable returns through diversification, including investments in commercial properties.
'Together with the growth in premiums, we believe we can achieve at least double-digit growth in both asset size and net profit in the foreseeable future,' he said, without giving a timeframe.
